Question for Objectivists

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How do you even live?

"Man—every man—is an end in himself, not a means to the ends of others; he must live for his own sake, neither sacrificing himself to others nor sacrificing others to himself; he must work for his rational self-interest, with the achievement of his own happiness as the highest moral purpose of his life."
-Ayn Rand

"Nobody has ever given a reason why men should be their brother's keepers."
-Ayn Rand

"I'm challanging the moral code of altruism."
-Ayn Rand

If I rejected altruism altogether I'd go crazy.

nine statements of satanism

1.Satan represents indulgence instead of abstinence.
2.Satan represents vital existence instead of spiritual pipe dreams.
3.Satan represents undefiled wisdom instead of hypocritical self-deceit.
4.Satan represents kindness to those who deserve it instead of love wasted on ingrates.
5.Satan represents vengeance instead of turning the other cheek.
6.Satan represents responsibility to the responsible instead of concern for psychic vampires.
7.Satan represents man as just another animal, sometimes better, more often worse than those that walk on all-fours, who, because of his "divine spiritual and intellectual development", has become the most vicious animal of all.
8.Satan represents all of the so-called sins, as they all lead to physical, mental, or emotional gratification.
9.Satan has been the best friend the Church has ever had, as He has kept it in business all these years.

eh huh em

This Satan characters sounds like he might have something.

ruveyn

As someone here aptly described them, Randroids... You can't ask a robot questions and honestly expect it to give you a creative or original answer. We are still decades away from true artificial intelligence

I never read The Snake Has All the Lines. Have read Screwtape.

Objectivism is a joke. Narcissism isn't a system of moral values, it's the rejection of moral values and it's plain rationalization to call it a system of moral values.

Yes, or at least an inversion of the definition of "moral":

mor·al –adjective
1. of, pertaining to, or concerned with the principles or rules of right conduct or the distinction between right and wrong;

No. It is an assertion of the primacy of rational self interest.

2200 years ago Hillel asked:

If I am not for myself, then who will be for me?

ruveyn

"Who would rise up for me against evil-doers? Who would stand up for me against workers of wickedness? If YHWH had not been my help, My being would soon have settled in silence. When I said, 'My foot has slipped,” Your kindness, O YHWH, supported me. When anxiety was great within me, Your comforts delighted my being. Would a throne of destruction, Which devises trouble by decree, Be joined with You? They band together against the life of the righteous, And declare innocent blood wrong. But YHWH is my defence, And my Elohim the rock of my refuge, And brings back on them their own wickedness, And cuts them off in their own wrongdoing; YHWH our Elohim does cut them off."
(Psalm 94:16-23, ISR)

Quite well and rationally, thankyou.



I would have thought that nothing in life was more important than the attainment of your personal goals and fulfilment. To me, as to most right-thinking, small r not big R, people, nothing is more important than the simple, rational statement, my life is my own, what I do with it and achieve with it is up to me.

Seriously. What's more important? Remember, you can't be altruistic without having something of your own to give up. You need to first get the something to give it up. I would never forego my own interests when faced with some strangers interests. It makes no sense.



Well. Give both her and me one and I'll gladly discredit it for you. The world has institutions and levers that enable the lives of those unable to help themselves. It is those with no inclination to help themselves, who won't help themselves, who expect others to bear the burden of their existence Ayn Rand and I despise. Such is why Atlas, believe it or not, shrugged. Atlas are the gifted and the productive whose large contribution keeps the world turning. They are their brother's keepers, anyway, inasmuch as their brothers would have nothing without them. Why should they provide everything to someone, a someone who provided the gifted and productive with nothing?

Nonsensical.



Immanuel Kant must die. He and Robin Hood. Think about it. Really. Think about it. Then try to defend them. I'll take them on when you can justify Kant's philosophical vacuousness and Hood's entitling the poor to wealth for no better reason than their poor. Being poor does not entitle you to wealth.



How so? Remember to move past the slackness of politically correct Newspeak and read the dictionary definitions of your words. Philanthropy is the endowment, usually of wealth, for more productive means. Charity is alsmgiving. Altruism is insane.

Thank you. I sleep quite well as a rule. No crises of conscience within me.

That is from Anton LeVey the founder of the Church of Satan. and Ming the Merciless look alike

scary scaaary

Are you opposed to such institutions and levers?

Here is the Ayn Rand center having a go at Bill Gates for pledging to give away wealth:
http://www.aynrand.org/site/News2?page= ... _ctrl=1221

Here they are going after the Facebook founder's decisions and the pledge behind it.
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2010/12/15/f ... nd-center/

The don't seem to be particularly interested in promoting either philanthropy or charity. They seem interested in ensuring that people not see those acts as morally positive.

Well, the objectivists can just go to Hell, then.

Being poor and being made poorer entitles one to at least pity and action. Your assumption (and Rand's, through the mouthpiece of Ragnar Danneskjöld) is faulty. If I recall, Robin Hood, at least in the versions of the story we have nowadays, is rebelling against unfair taxation. Of course, that story itself is faulty in that Richard the Lionheart was supposedly a saint, when in fact he was the cause of the taxation (for his crusades), not to mention something of an SOB, but that's not the point. Hood was giving money that was necessary for the peasants to live back to them, when it had been unjustly taxed. Actually, he's probably closer to a libertarian hero than you or Rand realise, given big business' reluctance to pay taxes. The only real difference between Hood and Danneskjöld is who they give the money back to.

And the thing is? The rich can afford to pay more taxes. Therefore, Danneskjöld's mission, outside the ridiculous world of Atlas Shrugged, is close to income tax fraud.

Don't get me wrong. There is obviously limits as to how far even a rich man can be taxed. But frankly, I don't think anyone has bothered to even approach the boundaries since the days of Henry VII. If a millionaire can afford multiple yachts or homes, they can afford a little more tax.

EDIT: And in case you are chafing at the idea of paying tax, think of it as paying for goods and services from the government. That should be something your Randy mind will comprehend. And if you want justification for more taxes going to something like, say, healthcare, if you were a millionaire, you could use it as PR, even if it has to be subtle. More good PR = more income. "My taxes are supporting your health and wellbeing. And I am doing it, for you."

Neither they, nor I, believe in it. I guess that I'll have to learn Blackadder's 'Five Minutes with a Pencil' trick.